Cups king's Kiwi pilgrimage

New Zealand has been a happy hunting ground for Bart Cummings, writes Patrick Bartley.

IN THE mid 1960s when Bart Cummings was cutting his teeth as a horse trainer from his modest base in Adelaide, he decided to make a rare overseas trip.

The journey wasn't grandiose or lavish. Cummings, then in his early 30s, was vitally aware of the pressing workload he was leaving behind in South Australia, but at the same time was also mindful of restocking his stable in years to come.

His unquenchable thirst for knowledge was the tipping point. The New Zealand sales staged annually in January had to be explored. He felt he owed himself a plane fare to study the country's stud farms and the sires it had introduced earlier that decade. The country fascinated him and its wealth of breeding stock intrigued him.

He was across most pedigrees the country had to offer. But Cummings wanted to see first hand the types of young horses that were being bred, the shape and conformation of the yearlings, and the prices they were fetching.

Over half a century later the man who has won nearly every major race on the Australian calendar is preparing for another voyage across the ditch.

This time it's with reservations. He fears he's seen the good times. The days of plucking a stayer with a dash of speed and good legs for a reasonable price is getting harder.

''The first year I went over I just stood back and watched. I didn't put my hand up. I just wanted to see what was on offer, what the stock was like and the strength of the families I could buy into,'' Cummings said.

''You see the old studmasters of those times were pretty smart blokes. They had the ability to go to England and buy a very good staying stallion for very little money.

''They would bring it home and mate it with some good brood-mares and then when it came time for the sales some well-bred, tough stock at a reasonable price would be in front of you. That's a good enough reason to keep going back.''

Cummings makes no secret of the fact the sales, based at Karaka, near Auckland, played a significant role in his rise to one of Australia's most revered trainers.

''I always need as much information about the female side of the pedigree. We all have ample insight about the sire,'' he said.

Cummings says that in the 1960s and for a few decades following the only information a yearling catalogue would show would be the upside of a mare's history.

''We want to know the whole story. The very good and the very bad. But you could go to New Zealand with some surety that if you liked a yearling it would always be in your grasp,'' he said.

''One of my great buys would have to be Red Handed. He was kicked in the head as a foal and suffered some nerve damage that ended up making his head look like a violin case. But he showed you don't gallop on your head by winning a Melbourne Cup.

''I paid $780 for Red Handed. My list of cheap horses that turned into good horses is a long one. What you have to try and do is make yourself completely across the female pedigree. Look at every generation on paper and then get to know their physical characteristics. While you might not buy this time around, in five years down the track the bloodline is still alive and producing - you can buy in then.

''But it's making yourself study the bloodlines from four dams back. I make a mental note of horses I have trained and years later another from that family comes into the sale ring, most of your homework has been done.''

But Cummings is concerned that the canny purchases of the Kiwi stud masters of yesteryear that made New Zealand great may not have been replicated in recent years.

''OK, they have got Zabeel and he's been good but he's 20 years old and not getting any younger. And what's behind him?

''I would have to say very little. And what do the likes of Patrick Hogan [who stands Zabeel] do once he's gone. It would seem go back to Europe and get a staying stallion. They will be doing the full circle in a way.

''Never forget Zabeel was a very cheap horse when you look back. I reckon [Colin] Hayes sold him for about $700,000 or no more than $800,000 when he changed hands.''

While Cummings, at 85, is cautious that the bloodlines may not be what they were, it still won't stop the multiple Melbourne Cup-winning trainer trying to snare another Red Handed in New Zealand this month.

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